Co-founder Manbeer Singh gave up a promising legal career to follow his dream of opening a brewery
Singapore’s 3rd Culture Brewing Company move from retailer to producer with the launch of their new Ren Min brewery.
Ren Min, Mandarin for “people”, is a modern craft brewery rooted in Singapore’s rich hawker culture. Celebrating the essence of Singapore the brewery aims to complement everything that is revered about the Lion City’s hawker culture with a range of flavourful, innovative and accessible beers.
Grassroots beginnings
The homegrown beer brand is the labour of love of beer lover Manbeer Singh. Ex-Lawyer Manbeer founded 3rd Culture Brewing Co, a small retail craft beer taproom in the famed Maxwell Food Centre in the heart of downtown Singapore in May 2016. Two years later he expanded to a second outlet at the Old Airport Road Food Centre, but the dream was always to start up his own brewery.
“From the beginning, we always had our eye on not only serving great beers from craft breweries around the world, but also from our own” says Manbeer.
With a name like Ren Min Manbeer hopes to use Singapore’s hawker heritage and strong community bonds as inspiration for the brewery’s beers. This can already be seen in their first batch of brews which feature prominent Singapore landmarks Kallang Airport and Jinrikisha Rickshaw Station and relate stories linking the brewery to these sites.
Progression American IPA, Aerodrome Session IPA & Eureka Grisette are the first Ren Min Beers to be launched, they all feature prominent Singapore landmarks on their label
Change of direction – change of name
Highlighting the transition from retailer to producer 3rd Culture Brewing have reimagined their two taprooms with a fresh, fun, and distinctive new look and name that reflects their new identity and connection to Singapore’s hawker culture.
A fresh new look for the existing taprooms has accompanied the brewery launch
The Maxwell beer stall has been renamed “Welcome Ren Min”, while the Old Airport location is now “Hello Ren Min” with Chinese characters that translate to “Craft Beer – High Quality and Fresh” below each name on their signage.
Manbeer and his partners are currently building a production facility in Sembawang with a brewhouse capable of producing batches of 2000 litres per brew. They expect this brewery to begin production in mid 2021, until then they are brewing their beers with friends around the world. Their first batch of beers were brewed in Sicily by experienced Italian brewmaster Dario Scuito, their next batch will be arriving soon from Vietnam, slightly closer to home.
Once fully operational the brewery in Singapore to not only produce a core range of Ren Min beers but will also offer a range of experimental and barrel-aged releases.
Manbeer wants the UNESCO World Heritage recognition of the Singapore hawker culture to be reflected in Ren Min’s beers: “Hawker food brings so much joy into the lives of everyone fortunate enough to experience it—and we seek to emulate that great hawker tradition by brewing reliably consistent, high-quality beer”.
The launch of Ren Min comes hot on the heels of Civilization Brewing Co., Niang Brewery Co. and Specific Gravity (SG) brewing all of whom poured their first beers in the citystate in the latter half of 2020.
With the commissioning of the new Brewlander brewery in Tuas and EightX brewery in Sembawang on the horizon Singaporean craft beer lovers are in for a heady time over the coming months.
